Flying Fish!

Those wacky Taiwanese! You never see Americans flying stuff like this, or US companies producing them, but the couple of people we'd seen flying the GWS Ladybug said it was great in wind, and Dave wanted a wind plane. (That was before he got the T-Hawk or the various flying wings, all of which are great in wind.)

One of the ladybug pilots told us that he'd heard that the fish actually flew better than the ladybug or the pizza, so that's what Dave got. (Followed by lots of buyers' remorse bemoaning how he should have gotten one of the other two.)

Building

Construction was a breeze compared to other GWS kits. The fuselage is very simple and well designed, and goes together quickly. Balance isn't as critical as it is on the zagi-type flying wings, and it's easy to get a good balance regardless of the batteies used.

Flying

The fish is one of the easiest flying planes we have. It springs into the air, massively overpowered at 7 oz with a 350C motor, then it floats around easily, or does spectacular aerobatic maneuvers if you ask it.

The best, though, is its spin. It's worth buying one just to fly it up high, put it into a spin and watch it come down like a fast-spinning leaf. Beautiful!

Dave says it flies great inverted, too; he's never had a plane that would fly inverted (the E-Starter sorta will if you try really hard, but it's difficult to keep it there) but with the fish, it's no problem. Of course, simple things like loops and rolls are a breeze. Dave's looking forward to learning more aerobatics on it.

Crashing

The nose section is a bit weak, and without any control inputs (e.g. if you lose your radio or lose sight of the plane) it tends to glide nose-down, and come down nose-first. Dave's already had one crash that broke the engine mount and the foam around it. But a little epoxy and tape put the plane back in the air the afternoon of the crash.

That afternoon he flew it into a signpost. Tore the wing a little, but nothing packing tape couldn't fix. Nothing else was hurt. I guess this fish is stronger than it looks.

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